Young
Indicator: Water Use
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What the results tell us for Young
The drinking water supply for Young Shire Council is provided through the Goldenfields Water County Council, which draws water from the Murrumbidgee River at Jugiong. The water availability for the whole system is controlled by license from the NSW Government and not by river flows. The limiting component in the whole supply is the capacity of the Jugiong Water Treatment Plant, which is currently operating at 54% above nominal capacity.
Supply - how much water could we have?
Young and the surrounding communities are supplied through Goldenfields Water County Council. The supply is sourced from the Murrumbidgee River and treated at the Jugiong water treatment plant which has full treatment facilities. The nominal capacity of the plant is 40 ML/day and is currently operated at 54% above capacity. According to Goldenfields Water this is unsustainable. A pipeline links the Jugiong plant to Young, by a branch from the Cootamundra pipeline. Young and other towns are supplied through this system via the Cowangs reservoir. The overall system has 14 sets of reservoirs and 8 pumping stations, and supplies 40,000 people living between the Lachlan and Murrumbidgee rivers in NSW.
The water intake from the Murrumbidgee is downstream of Burrinjuck dam, which is the major water storage reservoir on the river supplying water to irrigation users downstream. The only limitation on supply volume is the extraction licence and any variations due to overall water availability. The current policy is to provide water to domestic consumers as top priority, so that the security of town supplies from rivers supplying irrigation systems is assured. Limited water storages are operated by town Councils from the pipeline supply, and are held constant at 85-90% of capacity.
How much water was available?
The ongoing drought has had major impacts on irrigation supplies on the Murrumbidgee, but limited impacts on town supplies. As an illustration, only 5% of the General Security Licence water for irrigation is currently allocated due to insufficient water in storage in the Murray-Darling system.
Consumption – how much water was used
Total use
| 2003/04 | 2004/05 | 2005/06 | 2006/07 | 2007/08 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total volume of surface water used per year in ML - from e.g. dams, reservoirs, rivers etc. | 1,337 | 1,304 | 1267 | 1418 | 1292 |
Figure 1. Young Shire Council area total surface water use
No data are available for use of non-reticulated water, but private rural water use for domestic, stock and irrigation can be expected to be considerable.
The roughly 12% increased water use in 2006-07 may be due to the greatly reduced natural inflows to the region from rainfall, which were the lowest on record.
Use by sector
| Sector | 2004/05 | 2005/06 | 2006/07 | 2007/08 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Residential | 521814 | 507184 | 567233 | 516966 |
| Commercial | 260905 | 253591 | 283614 | 258478 |
| Industrial | 182633 | 177513 | 198530 | 180935 |
| Rural trunk main customers | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Institutional | 143497 | 139475 | 155988 | 142163 |
| Bulk sales | 65226 | 64614 | 64614 | 64614 |
| Public parks | 130452 | 129239 | 129239 | 129239 |
| Rural/Irrigation | 0 |
Figure 2. Water use by sector – Young Shire Council area
It is apparent that the most substantial single category of use is in the domestic supply; however the non-domestic water uses account for about 60% of the total use.
Environmental flows
This is not relevant to Young, apart from the water quantity and quality discharged by the wastewater treatment plant, and its use.
Managing water demand and use
Level 1 restrictions has been in place for 210 days during 2007-08, with no restrictions prior to that year. Water consumption in 2007-08 fell back to the quantity use from 2004 to 2006. The restrictions imposed consist of the use of one hand-held hose at any time, with fixed sprinklers, drip irrigation, lawn watering and unattended hoses between 6pm and 8am on any day. Compared to other levels of water restriction in NSW, Young has only a slight level of restriction.
Between 2004 and 2008, a total of 1,200 ML of treated wastewater were used for irrigation a golf course.
Future water supply
The supply is primarily controlled by licence, and secondarily by the ability of Goldenfields Water County Council to supply the required volume. The Jugiong drinking water treatment plant is running well over nominal capacity, and this is regarded as unsustainable. If further development in the Young area requires additional water the capability of the present treatment plant to supply this water is open to question
About the data
Quantitative data received from Young Shire Council
